


Grimdusk to Dawn

by SteampunkCow



Series: From Hell with Love [2]
Category: AU - Fandom, Homestuck, Homestuck AU - Fandom
Genre: 1783, 1818, AU, Abuse, Africa, Angels, Angst, Backstory, Boats, Corporal Punishment, Crime, Death, Demonstuck, Devils, Drama, Eternity, F/F, F/M, Fate, Fault, France - Freeform, Grimdark, Guilt, Heaven, Hell, Horrorterrors - Freeform, Imprisonment, M/M, Montauduins, Nantes, Pain, Payback, Plot, Pressure, Protective Siblings, Punishment, Rap, Rape/Non-con Elements, Regret, Revenge, Slave Trade, Slavery, Survival, Torture, abolishionists, abolishment of slavery, blame, capital crime, demon!alphabro, french trading ports, french!striders, grimdark!mom lalonde, historical fiction - Freeform, incubus!dirk, like damn, lots of fucking drama, no like actually, scarred boys, ships, slaving ships, trans-atlantic, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-07
Updated: 2014-03-26
Packaged: 2018-01-14 21:38:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1279789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SteampunkCow/pseuds/SteampunkCow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They don't call it the business of the Damned for no reason.<br/>His name was Dre Strider, and he had only the best intentions when he joined the lucrative business of the Slave Trade.</p><p>-France, late 1700s, Dre only wanted to keep his two sisters out of the streets.<br/>-There's always equal punishment for the crime.<br/>(Dre Strider is Alpha! Bro, and this is a very hefty ass au- giving the background for Dre)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Intro

**Author's Note:**

> what better way to start off a backstory, than with a rap?

 

 

> _Roxxanne, you don't have to put on that red light._  
>  _Roxxanne, you don't have to sell your body to the night.  
> _ _His eyes upon your face, his lips caress your skin, his hands upon your hands,_
> 
> _It's more than I can stand._
> 
>   
> _Why, does my heart cry, feelings I can't deny._  
>  _If you'll leave me just please dont decieve me_  
>  _And please believe me when I say, I love you._
> 
> _Rosa will you guide me onwards, show me how to l_ _ive for others_  
>  _Tell me that she always loved me,tell me how to always love you_  
>  _Show me that you can forgive me show me how I can forgive me_  
>  _Let me pull away, god help me, let me stay away, god help me,_  
>  _Heal over these wounds, the ones that never can seal, the past we always conceal._  
>   
>  _Yeah, its like, I had a past, brought many last moments, atonements, condonements_  
>  _Can I really feel sorry, for worry, and payments to hurry, along their dark story_  
>  _Bout my wrong-doings against them, yet it was for them, for the others_  
>  _That don't have mothers once I sold them, paroled them from my ruling- new schooling_  
>  _Abolishment of my astonishment of my payment over their sentence_  
>  _The sentence of their life, to a new strife, at the knife or the whip_  
>  _Hear the quip of their voices, brought by my choices, as I turned them_  
>  _Over to their fates, sourcing future hates, push me from heavens gates_  
>  _So I fall, and raise up my wall, trapped within, with-all_  
>  _My troubles._  
>  _So tell them that I'm sorry._  
>   
>  _Roxxanne, you didn't have to put on that red light_  
>  _You didnt have to sell your body to the night._


	2. This Time

Time is an odd thing, it’s something that you think will go on forever, something that can never end. But then you reach the end of the line and you’re suddenly out of time. Or you run out, your tank is empty and there’s no way to refill because you lost the knowledge of how to, the recollection always leaving you behind in an infinite circle with edges that you can turn. You can’t turn the corner, your steps are warped and you’re stuck. Lost in time even though everything is just a right angle and two steps away, you’re out of time. You’re left with this knowledge, and you’re left with eternity stuck in an ever changing world where you can’t get beyond one bump in the road, one turn in your pathway. Like one of those Chinese ghosts, you can’t go up steps. You’ll never reach the peak of your echeladder because you’re held back from what you can never escape.  
            Your mind. Your guilt. Your past. Your life.

            You are time, and yet you are trapped by it, trapped within yourself or by yourself.

The analogy goes on forever and yet at some point it must stop, just like you have. Frozen in one point, and yet your ship has set sail, all the passengers leaving their past behind while you drag yours forwards at the bow.

            You simply are.

And this consumes you; him.

This concept consumes him, Dre Montaudoin.  
Dre Strider as he is now, yet he can never progress forwards from his past, Montaudoin-Strider, it loses its ring though- so just Strider. It’s his best attempt to start anew after his story ended. It began.  
            This is his past, and then, there will be his present- but from here on, that will be his future.

 

From this dusk to his later dawn.  



	3. C'est la vie

Dawn; in these times, it’s when the whole town wakes up, the fishermen are first, hauling out their little skiffs and nets to get the best catch. Second are the farmers, taking the cool early light as an invitation to get all the hard work done first. Third are tradesmen- they’ll be the first to open shop therefore the first to get business.  
Then there are the Traders. Not of simple wares or textiles, no, not of any craft exempt of the fine craft of apathy to one’s fellow man. But these traders do not deal with men, they are different, so they are lower.

They are the slaves. From another land, the Africans, they’re from a darker world than the west and therefore nothing but a means of obtaining riches.  
  
This is something of a motto to all the Traders at the French port of Nantes.  
All the traders except one.  
 For to him, the slave trade meant life for his sisters.

\--

“Don’t look at them Dre, their eyes will drive you mad. It’s better to just think of them as any other livestock. Set sail, load them on, sell them off, come back home, divide pay. That’s how we run ship, boy. Don’t forget that _. C’est la vie_.”  Jaques Montaudoin grumbles, awkwardly pressing a large hand to the shaking shoulder of the boy in front of him. Boy no longer; in this business every boy is a man.  
He’s sixteen and gangly. Already tall for his age, his wiry muscles just beginning to full out his lanky frame. All pale arms and legs, he hasn’t had enough sun for his freckles to show- but they’re noticeable on the bridge of his nose and sharp collarbones. Beneath his halo of white blonde hair, he has bright eyes, or formerly bright eyes; fits the brown- red color better… but there’s still a sharpness in them, crimson flecks- desire and hope. A future… Jaques shakes his head, the kid would soon learn better.  
                Dre nods nervously, chewing the inside of his lip, forcing himself to avert his eyes from the hapless writhing in the inner hull of the ship. His mind fleeing back to his sisters’ faces, freshly washed and glowing- faint smiles on their dark lips, their heavy lidded eyes watching him- batting blonde lashes as they laughed… It had been on his down payment, 50livres, he gave them each 20, keeping 10 for himself. He would earn more and wouldn’t need much at sea… The girls had gaped in awe at the coins, choosing to give in mostly and spend it on luxury. Fresh bathes and new clothes.. queens of their own for a day or two.  
                Dre half smiles, happy  that he could purge them, even for a few days,  of the weary sadness that had overcome their lives . The expression falters when he glances down again at the cargo.  
 _They had sailed 3 months to pick up three score of a people caught just nights before._ The thought makes something curl in his gut and Dre turns around, holding his sides- a cold sweat breaking over his skin, sticky in the muggy weather of the African coast. He bares to look up again at Jaques, his surrogate uncle.  
“How is this right?” His question is one he had been asking himself since he chose to give into the pressure of the Montaudoin name, slaving. Jaques furrows his eyebrows, looking Dre squarely in face, his voice stern and final.  
  
“It is.  If you second guess yourself here, then you’ll be forgotten just like your cause.” His words ring in Dres ears and the boy straightens, his angled cheeks  flushing with anger.  
“I’m not forgetting Rosa and Roxxanne! I-I’m not second guessing myself. I’m here for all of it, I’ll get used to it. Just have to give me sometime. C’est la vie, right? This is life.” He insists, his long fingers curled into dirty fists at his sides as he walks to the edge of the deck- looking down at the black waves crashing against the bow. Muttering to himself. “this is life.” This is how it is, and no matter how much it felt wrong, he would accept this, because he would never let his sisters down.  
"C'est la vie"


	4. First Steps

Dre looks back at the rest of the bustling ship, shielding his eyes from the glaring sun of the morrocan coast. The air somehow perpetually dry against the salted back of his throat- long since coated with the thick sea spray from his months already on board the CoeurTemps. He scoffs, shaking his head at the name. He found it almost dreadfully ironic, the TimeHeart or HeartTime. There is no heart, no soul to be found on board not even in the spirited cargo hold. It seemed as though every person that stepped onto the maple planks of the ship had their soul wrenched from them. Their very being gone in the incriminating touch of their foot to the wood. And suddenly, they too were out of time... not like they would have any need for either heart or time where they were destined.

The teenager grimaces as he stares out at the dull red-brown horizon of the mainland, the strange provider of their living cargo.. he squints at the dustcloud rising towards the CoeurTemps, the caravan of traders had finally arrived at the port.  
Taking in a deep breath, Dre clenches his jaw and tries to straighten his posture. He wasnt damned just yet, he hoped... his shoulders slouched however, implicitly battling with his conscious to determine the weightier cause: a better life for his beloved sisters... or the natural human rights that the men and women, stumbling forwards in their cutting chains and bruising yokes, had.  
Dre once more repeats his mantra, assuring himself that this was life, and he perks up. Stiffly following Jaques from the ships deck, the older frenchman turning once they reached the sandy rocks of the land off of their boarding planks, placing the thin leather pouch of coins into Dres hands. The weight accursed already. Blood money, without the heavy iron smell, but instead the sickly, meaty odor of petrified flesh and the feeling of abuse that came with the stench.  
"You choose the cargo this time, Dre, make sure you get us a stock that will have greater yield in the newworld"  
Dre feels himself nodding in obediance, mumbling a "yes sir" automatically his feet leaden as the short heels if his shoes clicked ominously on the shoddy boardwalk wood. The first steps, real steps, to his new life as a trader.  
A slave trader.


	5. Down the Line

Dre wearily approached the platform where the line of prospects were standing, barely clad and the bareness of their ranging skin from tan to the deepest night was wrought with sloppily disguised bruises.  
Dre assumed what he thought was a brave face, resembling his cold poker face, his lip trembling, curling at the smell at sight... like beasts.. they were beasts.. arent equal.  
He tries to convince himself this.. maybe to feel less guilty.  
Jaques said it would get easier with time if he just didnt care.  
Forgot god, for there is none here.

"Step forward one by one. Say your.. name and age..I'll give you your-" he gulps looking wide eyed over to Jaques for an assurance which would only make him feel worse. He swallowed the feeling down with a tight throat "christian names... this is your christendom."  
Dre went down the line, feeling and observing their physiques and giving them new names- feeling each word sourly on his tongue.  
He reached a towering wild woman, with bright green eyes, defiant as she struggled against her bondsresembling a mad do backed into a corner- the rusted iron of the chains the wall behind her.  
"Nafasi"  
Dre furrowed his eyebrows, resisting the urge to cower at her barked tone, the growl of her voice boring into his mind, his eyes stared at the hatred in her green ones.  
"Jayde."

\--

Dre reached the end of the line and turned around, his fists white knuckled. So this was the beginning. He didnt move as the line of slaves marched past him, spitting at him and cursing him in their own native tongue as well as his own. The crack if whips not serving to silence them, too fresh as of yet. He watched Jayde stalk after the others at the end of the line, her eyes casting a last glance at her home and her look if horror as she noticed the resr of her family, thus betrayed by her village, coralled into the hold with her, pulled off to different junctions, her voice yelling in protest. Silenced as the door of the hold is lowered, shutting her and the others into the long night voyage.

\--

Dre looked on, wiping furiously at his eyes, hating himself for crying, and hating hinself for caring. Hating himself for trying not to care. Lost in the paradox if his feelings, he was urged back onto the ship, finding his hands digging into the railing of the bow of the ship as the sails unfurled.  
The next portion of his journey beginning. This leg would be found lame and put to death.  
Functional is all that was needed now. For use and money.  
  



	6. A lesson to be learned

Dre shudders, taking in useless breathes, he couldnt find his lungs. He clutches a his arms, his knees bumping his chin as he curls in on himself. His hot tears scorching treks into his cheeks, but when he looks back at his reflection-there are no scars marking his crimes into his skin, even though he feels the red streaks.  
Dres voice cracks, bubbling in pleads to himself, begging for reason and solace, comfort which he could never find now.  
It had been two months on the CoeurTemps, and the hold was never silent. They never ceased in their songs, their odes to dreams; the realities they lost when they woke up to shackles and his own face inscribed with the devils prayer. His tear tracks were invisible to them as well, his is the enemy, the bad guy.  
He has no mercy  
\--  
"Strike her again, Dre. Teach her the lesson they all must learn. They dont have a right to freedom, they must act and live how we tell them. Obediance gets us our price, rebellion only gives us more corpses to return to the waves.which would you rather, boy? Choose life or death for them. Help them and help us."  
Dre knew Jaques' words were lies, but he scrunched his eyes shut and let his hand snap again, delivering another blow. The leather whistling through the air and clipping more slices into the dark skin of the womans back.  
Dre couldnt even stand to think of her with a name, christian or not, names meant too much. They were too human.  
Jayde cried out despite her gritted teeth, twisting her wrists fruitlessly in the sailors' grips as they held her kneeling between them. The blonde behind her cracking the whip again, flogging her bare back with the knotted length.  
Her blood flinging into the air, following each stinging trail the whip lined as Dre drew more into her skin. Counting in cursed silence to himself, flinching with ever number, every stroke against her back, every tear track that would marr his face later. Out if sight from the crippling judgment, duty, and crashing expectations.  
Dre didnt know if he could keep this up.  
But Jaques said he was doing a good job.  
This reassurance pummeled Dre into anxiety attacks every night beneath his blanket, his hammock swinging like the stribgs if his heart, his every action severing the chords he had so carefully arranged in his short life so far.His humanity surely quipping away, dwindling to fearful lows.  
Dre was scared.

**Author's Note:**

> yooooooooooo if you're just starting this, you should also read the first fic in the series The Price of Love (because this is kinda a prequel.... I mean, its goddamn backstory so..)


End file.
